1. Field of Invention
The disclosure relates generally to the field of data and content delivery. In one exemplary aspect, the disclosure relates to apparatus and methods for efficient delivery of electronic program data.
2. Description of Related Technology
Recent advances in digital information processing and technology have made a whole range of services and functions available for delivery to consumers at their premises for very reasonable prices or subscription fees. These services and functions include digital content or programming (movies, etc.), digital video-on-demand (VOD), personal video recorder (PVR) and networked PVR (nPVR), Internet Protocol television (IPTV), digital media playback and recording, as well high speed Internet access and IP-based telephony (e.g., VoIP). Other services available to network users include access to, and recording of, digital music (e.g., MP3 files), as well as local area networking (including wire-line and wireless local area networks) for distributing these services throughout the user's premises, and beyond. Network-delivered or network-based gaming and applications (“apps”) have also each recently come to the forefront as popular content areas for subscribers.
In order to assist a subscriber in navigating this myriad of deliverable content, electronic guides are available. Modern electronic program guides and interactive program guides (collectively “EPGs”) provide menus that present broadcast programming or scheduling information for current and upcoming programming. EPG commonly are used in television systems to enable a user to view information relating to broadcast content.
An interactive EPG enables a user to interact with the presented guide data. User interactions may include navigation of the menus, selection of content, and scheduling a recording or viewing using a remote control apparatus, keyboard, or other means of input.
In many current systems, data necessary to create an EPG is delivered to each device by content distributors and/or vendors. The data may be delivered via in-band or out-of-band signaling. The client devices then use the information to build the entire EPG. Alternatively, the EPG may be generated at a network or cloud entity and delivered to the devices (including delivery of updates relating thereto).
Each of the above-described scenarios suffers from inefficiency. For example, in the instance the entire EPG is built at the client device, significant bandwidth and other resources must be dedicated to the data delivery and delivery of updates. In addition, the client devices themselves must comprise sufficient internal processing resources in order to piece together the EPG, and additionally update the EPG with each data update. Network resources and bandwidth are also used to provide the compiled EPG to the devices as discussed above. Moreover, the foregoing methods both require a significant amount of wasted resources attributable to the steady influx of data requests from the devices (such as for EPG data and/or for the completed EPG, and updates to each).
Therefore, what are needed are methods and apparatus for a more efficient delivery of electronic program guide data. Ideally, the improved methods and apparatus would alleviate the significant burden on resources which the current systems create and increase overall efficiency of the EPG system.